[Rockingham]

The F-4 had power and swagger but little beauty. Burdened by a demanding set of requirements, the F-4 design had an excess of aerodynamic kludges and compromises that needed two big, thirsty, smokey engines to shove it through the sky. Ugly but durable, the F-4 performed well enough and had a long enough production run to become the iconic third generation American fighter aircraft.

Yet, as the reform-minded "fighter mafia" showed, the F-4 was inherently flawed as a dogfighter and suffered too many avoidable losses to smaller and more nimble MiG-21s over Vietnam. For a successor to the F-4, John Boyd, an Air Force pilot turned Pentagon procurement officer, rejected a wish list of requirements in favor of a performance equation based on his authoritative energy-maneuver theory of fighter combat. This offered aircraft designers a wider scope for their talents. The result was the superb F-16, with the runner up becoming the Navy's F-18.

[Yardstick]

Yeah, exactly — swagger. The F-4 is pure coolness.

It’s the Han Solo of jet fighters.

The technical nitpicking is just nerd stuff.

[Yardstick]

Oh, I agree the F-16 and F-18 are nice in a Luke Skywalker kind of way.

But anyone with any sense of aesthetics has got to love the F-4. It’s the rumbling Harley Davidson of fighter jets.